


Five Times Liz Shaw and the Brigadier Saved the World

by vvj5 (lost_spook)



Category: Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Classic Who companions are awesome, F/M, Liz Shaw is awesome, Women Being Awesome, the brigadier always arrives in the nick of time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-29
Updated: 2011-04-29
Packaged: 2017-10-18 19:22:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/192373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lost_spook/pseuds/vvj5
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Season 7 without the Doctor.  Surprisingly, the world doesn't end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Times Liz Shaw and the Brigadier Saved the World

**One: First Battle**  
Liz had spent nearly an hour washing herself more thoroughly than she could ever remember. Now she brushed her thick hair with a vengeance.

Of course, she should know better than to let her tongue run away with her or be so set on proving her own superiority that she went into a situation with her mind closed and her scientific objectivity at bay. It seemed that she didn’t and if ever anyone had been forced to learn that lesson, she had over the past few days.

She’d spent the first day divided between smirking and raising her eyebrows and arguing with men in uniform. After all, she’d been summoned from Cambridge by a Brigadier who then unreasonably demanded that she not only work for him but that she started to believe in extraterrestrial life-forms. Naturally, she gave him her opinion about that and refused. Slightly more disconcertingly, she found herself being smartly manoeveured into staying for 'a few days'.

She’d followed him out - Lethbridge-Stewart - to look at meteors that weren’t. They seemed to be plastic, which to her mind, proved that there was some sort of fakery at work. She should have taken more note when they hadn’t responded to the usual tests.

Then it had been killings – soldiers dying, people vanishing at a factory that made dolls. (How could she be expected to take something seriously when the Brigadier wanted to make something suspicious out of a place that made _toys_ , for heavens’ sake?)

Today, when they’d finally got inside, despite obstruction from the regular army, and blown up a tentacled monster in the heart of the building, she’d had to admit that the man had a point. The news was full of unaccountable stories about marauding shop dummies, some of which she’d seen for herself at the factory.

And here she was, still unsure that she’d washed all the alien gunk away. The smell was going to haunt her for days. She contemplated another bath, but decided there might be a water shortage if she continued.

Liz Shaw thought Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart was an insufferable man, who unfortunately, happened to be right in this instance and she was wrong. It was maddening. He seemed to act as if this sort of thing was only to be expected.

On the other hand, she couldn’t help thinking, it had been a long time since she’d felt this curious about what tomorrow would bring.

 

***

 

**Two: Plague**

“Can you do it?” he asked without preamble, closing the door behind him as he entered the small office she was using as a makeshift lab. He walked across to the bench and turned his head to look at her. “Miss Shaw?”

Liz prepared the next slide. “No.”

He absorbed this with only a twitch of acknowledgement. “You realise what you’re saying? Are you sure there isn’t anything I can send for or -?”

“Yes, of course I know what I’m saying!” Liz snapped around, facing him now. It was no time for pride or one-upmanship and it was certainly no time for lies. People were dying.

The Brigadier did not accept this. “If you need help, you may have as many of my men as you need -.”

“I don’t need anyone to clutter up the room and break things, but when I do, I shall be sure to take you up on the offer.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Miss Shaw, you must find a solution.”

“It’s no good standing there and telling me what I have to do,” she said, pushing a strand of hair back out of her face. Her forehead was sweating. “Given enough time, I probably could come up with a solution. It’s a process of elimination in essence. However, we don’t have enough time, so I can keep trying but what I really need is another scientist – someone who has made this sort of thing their life’s work, preferably. What I don’t need is any more soldiers!”

He registered this, but seized on the one piece of information that appeared useful. “Do you know of a scientist?”

“I-.” Liz paused and then she saw what he meant. “Yes, but you can’t bring anyone else down here!”

He smiled faintly. “I think, in the circumstances, we can. Who?”

“A colleague,” she said, having to climb back down off the ledge. “Professor Evans.” She pulled out her notepad and started scribbling things down. “This is his address. And that’s some of the things I’ve tried. He’s a bacteriologist and a virologist – I’m sure he’d be able to make some headway with this.”

“Is he now?”

She looked up, suspecting sarcasm, but there was no evidence of it on his face. “If you can get hold of him, he’ll come. He lives for his work. He wouldn’t see the danger – only a fascinating new subject.”

“Really?” said the Brigadier in a tone that made her wonder for a moment if his opinion of scientists might sometimes be on a level with her opinion of soldiers.

“He’ll do it,” she said.

He nodded and then moved back to the door, brisk again now that he had a course of action to take. He paused there a moment to say, “Anyway, keep up the good work. You might get there before he does.”

He was gone before she could make a retort and was left wanting to shake him for his misplaced faith in her abilities. She didn’t know everything, damn him.

*

It was amazing how quickly the government could requisition a scientist when the world was about to end and she should know.

Albert Evans was flown in and duly arrived, acknowledged her with the briefest of nods, went straight to the microscope and stared down in short-sighted interest. “Now what do we have here?”

Liz prepared slides and answered his questions about what had been tried so far.

“Ah,” he said thoughtfully. “Fascinating.”

She bit her lip. It was, in its own way. An alien virus – or at least, a previously unknown virus – designed to attack human beings as efficiently as possible. She understood the abstract and scientific pleasure there could be in tackling these things.

“Clever little thing,” he muttered, studying it breathlessly.

She glared.

*

She’d told him all she could, made notes, prepared further slides and fetched materials for him. He was still acting like an excited schoolboy and she decided to leave him for a moment before the memory of the plague’s earliest victims made her do something that would disrupt his work.

She went to see someone else before she lost her temper.

*

She found the Brigadier in his temporary headquarters, busy fending off important phone calls.

“Has he found a cure?”

She gave him a look. “Not yet, Brigadier. He was sounding hopeful when I left, though.”

“No, not yet,” she heard him echo into the receiver. “Yes, we are doing our best. I can assure you, sir -. Yes. Of course.”

One of the other three phones rang and she reached for it.

In between phone calls, she passed him the opposite receiver. “Are politicians always that unpleasant?”

“The situation is a little too urgent for politeness,” he returned. “The death toll is rising, Miss Shaw. This fellow of yours had better be good.”

She cut off another caller. “Oh, yes he is. He’s brilliant.”

“Shouldn’t you be giving him a hand?”

Liz reflected that she should. “I thought I should update you.”

“Update me?”

She folded her arms. “I’m sorry. He was _enjoying_ himself and I -.”

“Ah,” he said, seeming to understand. In the middle of an endless and unreal nightmare of a day, she found that strangely comforting. “Nevertheless, you should be with him. I’m sure he’ll need help and you’re the one who’s been taking a look at the virus so far.”

Liz nodded, but before she could leave, Whitaker stormed through the door, deranged and infected and full of hatred for the Brigadier.

*

“Are you all right?” Liz caught at his arm, unthinking. Whitaker had collapsed. He hadn’t harmed the Brigadier, but if they stopped playing this game, thinking that they could somehow work out a magical cure for a virus in a matter of time, they would have to acknowledge that this was the way they were all going to end and it wasn’t pretty.

He nodded, as if people tried to kill him everyday. She supposed that it wasn’t all that out of the ordinary for him. “You should return to Professor Evans.”

She laughed to herself and wondered if she was beginning to veer towards hysteria, because she’d never expected to find herself locked under ground, threatened by strange creatures who claimed that the earth was theirs and who were prepared to wipe them out to get it back. And they were relying on a man so obsessed with his work, she’d mocked him herself, last time she’d had anything to do with him. “We used to call him Mad Albert,” she said.

There was a pause. “Miss Shaw, that isn’t inspiring.”

*

Liz re-entered the room and stopped. Professor Evans was no longer at the workbench, he was lying on the floor, the stool over-turned beside him, smashed slides scattered around the room. Blood stained the floor. He wasn’t a joke, nor a brilliant scientist any longer. Nor was he about to save the world.

*

“One of the creatures got in,” the Brigadier said grimly. “Hawkins got a shot at it, but it got away.”

Liz nodded, letting her hair fall in front of her face. She had an uncomfortable feeling she’d screamed for him, out in the corridor. Mercifully, she couldn’t be sure. What had happened between finding Evans and his arrival on the scene was unclear in her mind. Shock, she diagnosed, as if observing herself.

“He’s dead,” she said. She knew that, so she must have stopped to make sure. It was so hard to think how things had gone.

He signalled for the men to remove the body and pulled her to one side. “Yes, he is,” he agreed. “And so will we all be if you don’t make sense of his notes.”

“Really?” She still felt as if she were watching herself from elsewhere; her laugh sounded unfamiliar in her ears. “You think scientists are interchangeable, don’t you? Kill Evans and I can do his work just as well. I told you. I _can’t_.”

“That sort of attitude is no use,” he barked. “You’ll have to do what you can. You told me that he was on the path to a solution -.”

“I said he was sounding hopeful!”

“Miss Shaw.”

She swallowed back further words and leant back against the wall. Why he couldn’t just give up, like anyone else, she didn’t know.

“I understand that you’re upset, but someone has to find a cure. I suggest you at least take a look at what he was doing and see where that leaves you.”

Liz glared at him. “With a broken microscope, shattered slides and a murdered colleague?”

“Miss Shaw,” he said, “you’re going to try everything you can until it’s too late. This is a scientific establishment. We can find you more equipment.”

She hated him for being right.

“We should be thankful that you weren’t in there, I suppose.”

Liz watched him go.

*

“Wait,” she said as the captain and one of the regular men were about to carry her former colleague away.

She looked at where he had fallen, what he might have been working at when he fell and then turned her attention to Evans himself, pulling a scrap of paper out of his pocket. UNIT was making her heartless, too, she thought.

“Here,” said Hawkins, seeing what she was doing. He pulled another sheet of notepaper out of the dead professor’s hand.

Liz discarded her find as a shopping list and unfolded this. In his last moments, he had clutched at it, tried to keep it from the creature and she hoped desperately that it had been something worth saving.

*

It wasn’t The Cure, all mapped out and ready to be made up, but it was a significant step along the way, a clear signpost. Liz gritted her teeth, prepared more slides; Captain Hawkins fetched her a microscope and when she told him to go away, informed her that the Brigadier wouldn’t hear of her being left alone if the creatures could get in like that.

*

“You’re sure this will work?”

After all that belief in her ability to solve the problem for him, he was now looking at her sceptically.

“We _have_ run tests.”

He reached for the phone with a brief nod. “Well done.”

That was gratitude for you, she thought.

“Wait,” he said, as she headed for the door. “There’ll be bound to be questions you’ll be better placed to answer.”

Wasn’t it over yet? She sighed, folded her arms and waited.

*

“We’re going to get everyone out of here,” the Brigadier told her later, as she finished clearing up the temporary lab. “We need to close the place down and then I’ve got orders to seal the caves.”

Liz had had a long, sleepless couple of days and only now was daring to believe that her cure worked in practice and that they weren’t all going to die horribly. “Good!”

He paused. “I thought you might disapprove.”

“They could have wiped out a large percentage of the world’s population,” she said. “I don’t have any sympathy for them.”

The Brigadier paused, his expression thoughtful. “I’m not so sure. Down there in the caves – I ran into one of the things – could have killed me and it didn’t.”

“And they have intelligence,” said Liz, following his point. Still, she shivered. She didn’t want to think of the reptiles still here, plotting against them. She realised gradually though the maze of tiredness that he might almost have been asking for her opinion. “But you have your orders?”

He nodded. “Can’t really argue with them in the face of what’s happened.”

“No,” she agreed.

Thinking about it, she didn’t see the creature that abruptly appeared in the corridor in front of them until he pushed her back, drawing his revolver. He fired. She flinched at the shots.

When he turned back to her, she said. “You can blow up the whole damned place if you like!”

He surveyed her for a moment and seemed to be biting back a smile. “Miss Shaw, I think you need some rest. You’ve saved the world; you may leave the rest to us.”

 

***

 

**Three: Gunshots**

“You _shot_ him.”

The Brigadier glanced at her. “If he’d taken one step further, he’d have been dead.”

“So you saved his life by _shooting_ him?”

He coughed. “Miss Shaw, I think perhaps the strain of the day -.”

“Oh, do you?” she snapped back. “Really? Being attacked, radioactive aliens wandering around, getting kidnapped and sneered at and then, when everything was all but finished, you shot that journalist!”

He said, “Of all the things that have happened today, I hardly think that’s the worst -.”

“I don't suppose he'd agree with you!”

“Miss Shaw, the man is fine. It saved his life and put a stop to that broadcast. He’ll be up and about in no time – no lasting damage done.”

“I’ve had enough,” she said. “I shall resign. I want to go somewhere I can do research without traitors, thieves, kidnappers or aliens interfering. And most importantly, I don’t want anything more to do with thick-skullled, trigger-happy, incompetent military idiots.”

He paused. “I’ll find someone to take you home. You can hand in your resignation in the morning.”

Liz glared. “I don’t think I want to go home. Professor Cornish will need help with those calculations and then, there’s the translation device -.”

“Professor Cornish can wait!”

She raised her eyebrows. “I was offering to do my duty. I thought you’d approve.”

*

_“What’s wrong? What is that noise?”_

_Ralph Cornish had a concerned look on his face. “Interference of some sort. I can’t seem to eliminate it.”_

_“It’s a pattern,” said Liz eventually as it came again. “It’s the same sound – listen.”_

_Professor Cornish paused. “It could be.”_

_“A signal?” said the Brigadier warily._

_Liz nodded. “Can you trace it?”_

_He departed to do so._

*

“I shall get you a car.”

“Good, because I have no idea what happened to mine. I suppose it’s lying on the side of the road somewhere.”

He shouted out the door at a passing UNIT soldier.

“How typical,” said Liz. It had been another very long day and she seemed to have saved up a reservoir of anger and resentment solely to burst on him now that it was over. “Always so heavy-handed! Do this, do that – yes, sir, no sir. Three bags full, sir.”

The Brigadier waited for her to finish. It was off-putting. He could at least have the decency to shout back.

“Oh, I can see what you’re thinking. I’m merely a hysterical female. You can’t possibly trust my judgement. Might as well send me home; get me out of the way -.”

“Liz,” he said, and the sudden informality silenced her. “I suggest you stop making ill-informed assumptions about what I’m thinking. You’ve had a particularly trying day, more so than the rest of us and I’m not going to be unreasonable enough to insist you stay here.”

She perched herself on the table. “I suppose you could be right. How about you? I don’t suppose your day was any easier.”

“No,” he agreed. “However, no one is expecting me to do complicated calculations.”

She couldn’t resist. “Just as well.”

*

_Everyone was pointing guns at her today. It had been Taltalian earlier and now she was being hunted down by a stranger. She swallowed and refused to show fear._

_Stupid, she thought, as she was marched off. She should have stopped to think before acting on the note that had supposedly come from the Brigadier._

_It wasn’t too much later – after she’d seen the aliens and spoken to Regan – that she realised that she was going to die._

*

“I should have said thank you,” she continued.

“What for?”

Liz lost her breath. It was exactly this sort of thing that infuriated her. “You _did_ rescue me – or had it slipped your mind?”

A sudden, inexplicable look of guilt and alarm crossed his face. “Good Lord, I forgot. I stole that car.”

“You did what?”

He glanced over at her in mild amusement. “We had no vehicles available, so I requisitioned one. I promised we’d send it back round as soon as we were done with it and I forgot. I must send Benton over with it. On second thoughts, better have him check it for damage first.”

“Oh,” said Liz. _That explained the Morris Minor pick-up_. “I see.”

He directed a look at her, daring her to laugh. “There wasn’t a great deal of choice.”

*

_“Well, come on, Benton,” he’d barked. “We’ve finally got a lead. We need to get on with it.”_

_The Sergeant had said, “I’m sorry, sir, but there aren’t any vehicles left.”_

_“Don’t be ridiculous!”_

_He said, “Well, there’s a bicycle out the back-.”_

_“We’ll have to find something,” said the Brigadier, glaring, since this was not the moment for levity. “Don’t just stand there!”_

*

“Now,” he said, “are you sure you’re all right?”

“Of course!”

He gave her a sideways glance, his expression sober. “That was a serious question, Miss Shaw. I’d like a proper answer.”

“I see,” she said carefully. “Do you have authorised leave of absence for abduction? How much for alien infection?”

He waited.

“Yes,” she said at last. “I shall be all right. It’s all over and done with.”

“You shouldn’t have been put in that position.”

She said, “It’s as well that I was. I don’t see how else we would have found out what was going on, or obtained the plans for the communicator.”

“True. All the same -.”

“And I know you had to do something,” she said, taking her conversation back to where they’d began, “but there’s been too much shooting today.”

He grimaced. “Regan.”

And Liz nodded, because saying ‘I thought he’d shot you’ would cross a line they’d avoided until now.

*

Liz woke in the night, dreams of silent, space-suited aliens and gunfights vivid in her mind. She drew in her breath, the feelings of fear clinging to her even though she’d emerged from the nightmare. She sat up, switched on the bedside light and instructed herself to be rational. Considering the sort of day she’d had, this was only natural.

She pulled her knees up against herself under the bedclothes, but she still felt cold. The room seemed empty and every inexplicable sound made her start.

She had been certain that she was going to die. She had accepted it as a fact and then pushed it to the back of her mind, much less important than trying to escape, collect information, build the device she was asked for. Don’t think about what was bound to happen one way or the other and, above all, don’t think about Regan’s gloating words: _I’ve dealt with your friends at UNIT_. Because she could die, but he couldn’t. That was simply out of the question.

She would leave UNIT eventually. There was only so much she could take of being ordered around by a military organisation, but when she went she wanted to know that he was still there.

Liz felt a terrible temptation to phone the space station, just to prove to herself that it was only a dream, a lie.

For heavens’ sake, she told herself. Pull yourself together. What would you say?

She picked up her book instead and immersed herself in _An Infamous Army_ until it was day.

*

Liz returned to the space centre in the morning, despite his instructions that she was on no account to do so. She was particularly bad-tempered all morning, which was entirely due to her lack of sleep.

It had _nothing_ to do with him.

 

***

 

**Four: The Computer Says No**

“One step further, Professor Stahlman and I shall fire,” said the Brigadier, facing the eminent scientist with a revolver in his hand. “If everyone else would like to continue?”

Stahlman narrowed his gaze and, then with an insolent look in his direction, took a deliberate step forward.

“ _Professor Stahlman_ ,” he said, his finger tightening on the trigger. “The rest of this room is in agreement, even the computer.

He clenched his fists. “This is insupportable. Am I to be lectured about my own work by a military ignoramus? Who knows most about this project?”

“You do,” said Petra, doubt creeping into her voice. Greg Sutton put a hand on her shoulder, but she gave him a slight shake of her head. “Why don’t you look at the results? Perhaps you can make some adjustments?”

He raised his chin. He wasn’t in the least bit afraid, although they were all against him. You had to give him that. “No adjustments are needed, Dr Williams. I told you yesterday, that _machine_ is malfunctioning!”

“It isn’t,” said Liz, her cool tones cutting through the heated argument. “I’ve checked and double-checked. It confirms everything the rest of us are concerned about – the speed of the drilling, and what will happen once we break through the earth’s crust. It predicts the pressure will be impossible to contain.”

Sir Keith coughed. “Of course, we would never do this otherwise.”

Greg had no desire to be polite to the scientist. “It’s like I’ve said all along. We’re heading for a disaster, not any magical source of energy lying buried at the earth’s core. That’s nothing but moonshine.”

“There is nothing magical about Stahlman’s gas,” said the professor. “You are merely displaying your ignorance. Now will everybody return to work – oh, and increase the speed to -.”

The Brigadier took control once more. “I repeat, Professor Stahlman, unless you’re going to help us, you will stay where you are and let the others shut down the drilling.”

“You imbecilic, jumped up soldier. How can you possibly understand the complexities of my project?” he spluttered. "If you do that we won't be able to start again."

“Apparently, that’s a good thing,” returned the Brigadier. “Miss Shaw?”

She nodded and she and Petra moved across to the controls. Stahlman looked at the Brigadier and took another step forward. “Dr Williams, I forbid you -.”

“Professor Stahlman! This is the last time I’m going to warn you.”

He sneered at him. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Oh, believe me, he would,” said Liz.

The Brigadier only said, “Lock him up, Benton.”

*

“Miss Shaw,” he said, later. “A word.”

She followed him into his office and waited.

“I’ve just threatened one of our top scientists and shut down a valuable government project, apparently at the whim of a computer. Perhaps you could tell me why?”

Liz opened her mouth to answer him and couldn’t, although she had an explanation ready to give him. It only now struck her that, once she had realised the severity of the situation and Petra had made no headway with Stahlman, she had run into his office, knowing there was no time to waste and all but ordered him to do this.

And he _had_.

“Liz?”

She shook herself.

“I can hardly keep him locked up forever,” he pointed out. “Once he gets the chance, he won’t let this go without hauling us over the coals. We’ve wrecked his life’s work.”

Liz said, “If we’d let him continue, you’d have had all the evidence you wanted, but I don’t know what would have become of us all. Don’t worry. I’ll collect the readings from the computer and write you a report. Sir Keith has already set off for London to head off some of the objections.”

“Nevertheless,” he said wryly, “money has been wasted and they’ll want someone to blame. I’d appreciate that report as soon as possible.”

She hung back at the door. “Sutton was right,” she told him. “Endless, free energy? It’s only a dream. Nothing ever works like that. There’s always a cost somewhere. Sometimes it’s worth it and sometimes it isn’t.”

“Very scientific,” he commented in amusement.

She smiled. “I can’t always be objective.”

“No,” he agreed. “Between you and me, I’m just relieved that infernal drilling’s stopped.”

*

Liz returned to help Petra, both finding themselves uncharacteristically laughing over small things and when she looked around the room, she could see that they weren’t alone in reacting that way. She felt in her bones that they’d narrowly escaped a catastrophe, unscientific as that was.

There was not a great deal to be done and while Petra left her to go in search of Greg Sutton, she found her gaze straying back to the office door.

He’d have shot a man on her word alone. She’d been right; she knew that absolutely, but it alarmed her.

She should say something. Or not say something, perhaps.

*

Liz walked back across to the door, only to find herself standing politely aside for Sergeant Benton, about to make a report.

“Don’t worry, Miss Shaw,” he said, seeing her annoyance. “You can speak to him first.”

She laughed. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll wait.”

*

He found her, much later, in the middle of the empty operations room, writing out her report. She paused to tear a strip of ticker tape from the computer.

“Did you want to see me?” he asked. “Benton said something, but I’ve been busy. Once we’d heard from Sir Keith, we had to let Stahlman out and he’s been troublesome to put it mildly. He’s set off for the capital to plague someone else – probably Sir Keith, poor fellow.”

Liz looked up. “To be fair, he must be devastated at everything ending like this.”

“Yes. True. Well?”

She frowned. “Sorry?”

“Did you want something?”

Liz made up her mind and felt almost triumphant. “Yes, I think I do.”

*

It was not, of course, the way a scientific adviser to a top secret military organisation should behave towards the commanding officer of said organisation, but to be honest, no one had ever written the rules for the situations they'd been through.

She’d come a long way from where she’d started, mocking his stuffiness, his belief in aliens – the very idea – and his ridiculous stance as the ideal English officer, as if there was such a thing. Since he’d taken the unlikely step of selecting her over any other scientist in the country, maybe it had been a shorter journey for him.

Certainly, she hadn’t had to explain her meaning a moment ago. He’d interpreted her words and the look in her eyes with remarkable alacrity.

Now he released her, to her disappointment. “Someone’s coming.”

Great heavens, she thought, since the pause gave a moment to see where her recklessness had landed her, she was going to have to resign. He couldn’t carry on a cloak and dagger affair to save his life, or even hers.

They moved back, round the corner and out of sight.

Petra moved across to her work desk. “I’m sure I left it here,” they heard her saying. And then, with half-hearted sternness, “Greg. Don’t. _Greg_!”

Liz leant against him and fought to stifle laughter.

“Come on,” he said in her ear. “We should go.”

They made their escape and, outside the building, in the dark, he coughed and moved away. She thought he was about to apologise.

“Don’t,” she said and kissed him again, determined to have this much at least. She was right, she would have to leave now, but she wouldn’t let that spoil this moment.

They were interrupted again, this time by a voice yelling out, “Who’s there?”

“Benton,” said the Brigadier, marching across, Liz trailing behind him. “It’s only us. I’m escorting Miss Shaw back to her quarters.”

Liz slipped her arm through his as the sergeant walked on past. “The whole world’s out to stop us.”

“Probably as well,” he said.

She looked away and sighed. “Yes, I suppose you’re right, Brigadier.”

“Liz,” he said, “I think we can safely assume that we’ve moved onto first name terms.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Call you Alastair? I’m not sure I can.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Liz,” he returned. "I don't think anything's beyond you." Then he kissed her again, despite all her expectations.

He trusted her, she thought and it sealed her fate more surely than anything else. It would hurt enough in the weeks to come, but for now it was a glorious goodbye.

 

***

 

**Five: Resignation**

Liz Shaw slid the piece of paper across the desk to him wordlessly. Then she folded her arms and waited.

“Liz,” he said, as he finished reading it, “are you sure?”

She met his gaze head on. “You know I’m right.”

“I’d like to be able to argue,” he said, his mouth twitching slightly. He glanced up at her. “Where will you go?”

Liz took the chair opposite. “Oh, I shall return to Cambridge. But you’ll need to find someone to replace me. I can stay until then, obviously.”

The telephone rang and he threw her an apologetic glance before answering it. “Lethbridge-Stewart. Yes?” He waited for a long moment. “In that case I’ll be right down there.”

“What was that about?” she asked, once he replaced the receiver.

He smiled at her. “Oddly, I think I’ve found someone. Seems as though the Doctor has turned up out of the blue. They’ve come across his police box out in a field somewhere.”

“Not your wonderful Doctor?” she mocked. “In that case, I shall pack my things and leave at once. You won’t be needing me.”

He rose from his chair and paused for a moment before replying. “No. Quite.”

“Sorry,” she muttered, with a distinct lack of grace. It wasn’t easy for her, either. “I can’t say what an experience this year has been.”

The Brigadier said, “It’s been a privilege.”

“Don’t,” she said. “Especially when I’ve tried my hardest to be as insulting as I could.”

He had humour lurking in his eyes, although he remained straight-faced. “True, but you have saved the world in between, so I overlooked it.”

“This is impossible,” said Liz carefully. “You and I both know it.”

He moved in nearer.

The door opened.

“Benton,” roared the Brigadier. “Get out!”


End file.
